The Wind Has Blown

So anyway. On the first of this month, I came into a windfall of sorts. $400, all in eight crisp $50 bills. This happens, well, very rarely, but on occasion. It's always a more than welcome occurrence.

I put the $400 away in a separate part of my wallet. Not that I wasn't going to spend it. I just wanted it segregated from my "everyday money."

I almost immediately spent about $75 of it on a spree at Target, getting some stuff for the house, a really nice lamp for the Mantrap, a little stand with drawers for my convenience at Oktoberfest, a dvd of "Farenheit 911," and a few other knicks and knacks. I mean, if a girl has a windfall, she should at least buy a couple of things for herself with it, right?

A few days later I made a WallyWorld run. This was not fun stuff for myself, but staples, like contact lens solution, shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, etc etc ad nauseum. I'm sure the amount of that little foray was somewhere around $60. It's a long-running joke in Betland. I never get out of the Wal-Mart for less than $60. I could go in for the express purpose of buying a pencil, but somewhere between the pencil aisle and the way out the door, they're going to find a way to charge me at least $60.

And finally, somewhere in all that was at least one dinner for me and Mr M. Let's call that $20 to be on the safe side. And after all that was spent as "mad money," I stopped.

So let's see, $75, and $60, and $20. That left me roughly $245. Which I earmarked all of for one thing and one thing only: gas.

I don't think it's any big secret how much I hate buying gas. I hate gasoline. I hate it, and I even live in a section of the world with some of the lower prices on the stuff. But it just seems like I'm on the damn road all the time. Driving 65 miles, back and forth, back and forth, up the mountain and down, I could do it in my sleep.

And so I have to buy gas. All the time. I usually put it on the gas credit cards and pay it all off on the first of the month, but when your bill gets to be $110, $130, $150 a month, well, it gets a little - a little, infuriating, I guess I'd call it. It's like, I know the bill is right, I know I've used that much gas - I mean, I see the entries right down there on the bottom of the bill - but just thinking about the cost that builds up makes me write so hard I tend to poke a hole in the check as I'm dotting the i in "Elizabeth."

Add to that the fact that Oktoberfest is this month - double the driving. So I really needed some gas relief, and I don't mean Tums.

I guess the Spending of the Gas Money would have started around October 4. It's now October 27. I have exactly $20 of the original $245 left. And - I'll have to have gas to fill me up to get to B'burg for band tonight, and get me home, and back up and down the mountain two more times, then back home. That's probably around $30, if not more.

$245 on nothing but gas in less than one month!

I'm hoping I'll get over the stomach-grinding hatred of oil companies when I get my two gas card bills this month and they both say "$0.00 due." But I doubt it.

I'm going electric. Anyone know Ed Begley, Jr's phone number?